Thoughts and Ruminations

I’m sitting in here in the seminary on a Friday night dealing with several large questions and frustrations looming in my head:
1) I am continually frustrated by my lack of motivation and unwillingness to even make rudimentary steps towards discipline in my life. Why must I struggle so much?
2) (Related to #1) I just spent last night talking with some good friends of mine about a man named Jonathan Edwards, who shared what I consider to be a nasty, convicting truth: those whose faith is weak spend their lives immersed in “woulds.” Por ejemplo, “I would like to,” or “I should,” or “I really do need to,” without doing jack squat practically speaking to get to that point.

I find some disturbing elements of this in my life, and that causes me to be a bit upset about the direction my life could potentially turn. Whereas I recognize the providence and grace God extends to me as his child, I cannot deny that Jesus reminded us that in order to be seen as his disciples, we must “pick up our crosses daily and follow him.” In short, stop the whining and decide to be a disciple! I find it nearly impossible at this point in my life to walk the middle road between cheap grace and rigid legalism, and it makes me sick to my stomach because my walk seems to be more about cheap grace than anything else. I talk about “intimacy with God” when I’m not living it out…I place extraordinary emphasis on the redemptive acts of God throughout all of human history and the beauty of what it means to enter into a relationship with him that is meant to transform us, our priorities, the way we interact with others: and yet I don’t see that transformation happening in my life. Maybe I’m just impatient, and I’m supposed to stop slamming my head against the wall and be still. Or maybe I’m allowing myself to slip into some surface Christianity: some feel-good, say-the-right-things-while-I’m-broken-inside-and-too- afraid-to-let-others-in-on-my-hurt twisted spirituality. I’m just so sick and tired of going through the motions in life like I have been over the past several weeks…well, two months. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God…have mercy on me. When my inner life, my motivations, and my driving ambitions deny you. Have mercy on me. I’m frustrated tonight…stream of consciousness writing works best sometimes.